Cops corral gang after they start graffiti war

"Yoo there's gonna be a graff battle near you. Actually, all over the area. Do you want the crown of this mountain? Post it back if you want in."

SUSAN KOOMAR

"Yoo there's gonna be a graff battle near you. Actually, all over the area. Do you want the crown of this mountain? Post it back if you want in."

-- "Graff Battle 06" message on Myspace.com

MOUNTAINHOME — Police have busted four teenagers who challenged their peers to a graffiti war via brazen messages posted on Myspace.com, a popular youth Web site.

A five-month investigation led to the arrests of Amy Young, 18, of Pocono Pines, and three younger teens from Pocono Pines and Tobyhanna, according to Barrett Township Police.

"I'm hoping it's going to take care of a lot of people's problems," said Barrett Police Chief Steven R. Williams.

The graffiti spree spread from Tobyhanna to East Stroudsburg, he said.

"Mount Pocono and Stroudsburg were hit hard," Williams said Friday.

The teens dubbed themselves KWV for "Kids With Vision." Their Internet exchanges included comments like, "This is an art form, not a crime."

Their Web postings, detailed in a police affidavit, described their graffiti misadventures and hatred of school. The kids often wrote that they skipped school after going on a spray-painting rampage the previous night.

"And I ended up with that black an pink still in myy coat, paint on my fingers an some bloody knees an i don't think im goin to school tomorrow!!! i hate it !!!," wrote one of the teens.

They called their town "Tobyhell" or "Tobyharlem" instead of Tobyhanna.

The criminal investigation started in February when the owners of Auto in Motion garage and Mountainhome Candle complained to police that their billboards were spray painted.

Tag names, which are like signatures or pen names, were painted in gray, pink, purple and blue on two billboards. Some letters were two- to three-feet high. The tag names used by the teens include BLAZE, KWV, and JBP.

A new wooden fence along Price's Drive in Mountainhome was also sprayed with tag names.

Police logged onto Myspace.com and searched the site's participant names for KWV. They found messages declaring a graffiti battle and even establishing rules like "take pics or tell people where it got bombed painted just in case po-9 police buffs removes it, because why waste all that paint for a war and no one to see it?"

Williams said police are becoming Web savvy.

"The kids are on Myspace.com so we have to be looking where the kids are looking," he said. "The Internet's a resource for lots of people including police."